Gay SF man charged in murder

NEWS

by Seth Hemmelgarn

A gay San Francisco man has pleaded not guilty to murder,
robbery, and other charges related to the death of a man he had reportedly been
caring for.

Michael John Phillips, 64, was arrested in late November in
the death of James Sheahan, 75, a gay man who was
found dead August 14 in his Nob Hill apartment.

Phillips, who's being held on $3 million bail, has pleaded
not guilty to charges including murder, first-degree
robbery, inflicting injury on an elder or dependent adult, manufacture or
possession of fraudulent financial documents, and receiving or buying stolen
property. A preliminary hearing, where a judge will determine whether there's
sufficient evidence to hold Phillips for trial, has been scheduled for
Thursday, December 7.

According to Bay City News, prosecutors
have alleged that "Phillips befriended Sheahan, seeking to act as a sort
of caretaker, and tried to get money from him before killing him when he
refused." Phillips also "has a history
of preying on sick elderly men in the gay community," prosecutors have
reportedly said.

Max Szabo, a spokesman for the
district attorney's office, declined to discuss evidence related to Sheahan's
death with the Bay Area Reporter.

Sarah Sheahan, who lives in New York
and is Sheahan's niece, said that her uncle, who'd been dying from Stage 4
cancer, had been hit in the head and the killer "attempted to make it look
like he committed suicide" by making superficial scratches on Sheahan's
wrists. She's not aware of a weapon being found.

Her mother told her that Phillips had
forged a check from her uncle.

"I think it was $10,000,"
she said. Sheahan's checkbook was also missing from his apartment at 969 Bush
Street, she said.

James Sheahan, who'd lived in his
rent-controlled building for decades, left his estate, worth between $300,000
and $500,000, to his brothers, his niece said.

Sheahan said that her father had met
Phillips, who'd been described to her as "a good friend who was
helping" her uncle, but that he hadn't been working as "an employed
caretaker." (Sheahan said that her family didn't want to speak with the
media.)

The medical examiner's office
hasn't issued a final determination of the cause of Sheahan's death.

According to Sheahan's obituary, he
moved to San Francisco in 1978 and worked for years at the city's Health and
Human Services Department before retiring in 2005.

"Jim's
passions were photography and movies," and his family "marveled at
the beautiful artistry of his photos," his obituary says.

Shock

While people who know Phillips have expressed shock at the
charges against him, they also indicated he'd been in financial trouble.

John Dawson, of Marysville, California, who's known Phillips
for 20 years, said that Phillips was "harmless."

"I never thought he would be capable of something like
that," he said.

Dawson said he met Sheahan a couple of times, and Phillips
told him that Sheahan "had given him money for helping him," but
Phillips had also made fun of Sheahan behind his back.

Phillips had "a series of jobs that didn't work out in
the last couple years," said Dawson, and he'd been fired from a Trader
Joe's for stealing.

A woman who answered the phone at the store where Phillips
had reportedly worked declined to talk about him.

Dawson said that Phillips was also fired from his job as a
manager at the Mark Hopkins rental condominiums at 1200 Sacramento Street after
his employer realized he'd been stealing from two elderly residents.

Phillips' former neighbors at the building, who didn't want
their names published, appeared stunned at the news of the charges against him.

"He wouldn't even correct the UPS guy when the UPS guy
was delivering things wrong. ... I can't really envision him murdering
anybody," one woman said. She said that Phillips had told her Barbara
Brooks, the building's owner, had fired him for stealing paperwork from her.

Court records show that Brooks filed an unlawful detainer
complaint against Phillips in November 2015. Phillips, who worked there as an
assistant residential manager, lived at the building rent-free as part of an
agreement he and Brooks signed in May 2014.

According to Brooks' complaint, Phillips was notified on
November 19, 2015 that his license to occupy his apartment had been terminated,
but he'd "refused" to leave. The records don't say why the agreement
was terminated.

Asked about Phillips in an interview, Brooks said, "He
resigned. He wasn't fired." She said she couldn't remember why she filed
the complaint, and she couldn't recall whether she'd accused him of stealing.

"We didn't want him around the building, for some
reason," she said.

Marriage

Victim James Sheahan. Photo: Courtesy Facebook

Dawson said that on October 30, 2017, Phillips and a man in
the Philippines that he'd met online married in City Hall. He said that
Phillips had traveled twice to see the man, whose name is Archie Arcaya
Fuscablo. Fuscablo arrived in San Francisco in October, said Dawson.

Friends thought it was "a scam," and Phillips
"was asking everyone for money. ... [Fuscablo] was asking Mike and Mike
was asking all his friends," said Dawson. "He was desperate to make
it all work and prove that it was real."

At the wedding, attended by Dawson and two witnesses, Fuscablo
turned his head when Phillips was going to kiss him, allowing Phillips to give
him a peck on the cheek.

Told of the charges against Phillips, Maria Nowicki, another
friend who attended the wedding, said, "I just
cannot believe it."

Nowicki said that she'd reluctantly
loaned Phillips $2,000 in August to help him bring Fuscablo over from the
Philippines. Phillips had agreed to repay her $250 a month, but he hadn't made
a payment since September, she said.

At the wedding, which she described
as "very, very weird," Nowicki said, "Mike seemed like he was
just anxious to get married so that everything would be settled ... Archie was
standing there almost like a robot" and showed "no emotion."

Dawson said that Fuscablo "flew back to the Philippines
the day after Mike was arrested."

Phillips declined to be interviewed for this story, and
Fuscablo hasn't responded to the B.A.R.'s Facebook messages.

In an October exchange with a friend
after Phillips posted that he needed help, he said that he'd lost his job and
finances had become "crippling."

He also posted in July that he'd
spent all his savings on an "LGBT documentary comic book film" called
"Secret Identities."

About a year ago, Phillips started a
Gofundme page for Fuscablo. The crowdfunding campaign is no longer live.